This invention relates to an apparatus for discharging weighed articles in an automatic weighing system. More particularly, the invention relates to an apparatus for discharging weighed articles into a contiguous container array delivered to the discharge area in the form of a plurality of transversely interconnected containers, the apparatus being adapted to discharge the articles into the plurality of transversely arrayed containers at one time.
A weighing system is available wherein a packaging apparatus is combined with a weighing apparatus. The system is so arranged that articles are weighed out into batches of a fixed weight, with each batch being charged into successively arriving containers and then packaged in continuous fashion. The time that the packaging apparatus needs to supply the containers and package them when provided with the articles is longer than that required for a single weighing cycle performed by the weighing apparatus. As a result, it has not been possible to exploit the full processing capacity of the weighing apparatus, making it difficult to raise the efficiency of the overall operation.
The containers into which the articles are discharged are often fabricated from plastic or aluminum foil by a technique such as deep drawing. As shown in FIG. 1, such containers are actually manufactured in the form of a unitary container array B composed of a plurality of contiguous, compartment-like containers A, . . . A which are transversely interconnected. When using the container array in the conventional weighing and packaging system described above, the container array B is cut so as to separate the containers A into individual units which must then be supplied to the apparatus in a single row. Then, after weighed articles are discharged into the separate containers A, a packaging operation must be performed for each and every container. The result is a great increase in the number of process steps.